


the tremors in my body make it hard to speak

by padfootprophet



Category: DCU (Comics), Titans (Comics)
Genre: DC Comics Rebirth, Getting Together, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-21
Updated: 2019-08-21
Packaged: 2020-09-23 09:56:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,408
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20338243
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/padfootprophet/pseuds/padfootprophet
Summary: Wally's still getting used to the subtle changes in reality, which seem to include his best friend being in to him. Not that he necessarily minds that part; he just needs to process it.





	the tremors in my body make it hard to speak

**Author's Note:**

> I finally went back to reading comics and gave Rebirth a try and was for a brief time loving it. But mostly I remembered how much I love these two.  
Title is from Tremors by Two Tongues.

Wally has gotten used to a somewhat flexible idea of reality. He's crashed in and out of the speedforce enough times now that sometimes it feels like he's falling apart; so he's learned to accept the good and hold on to what he does have.

Still.

"You kissed me," he says, startled and wide eyed and staring at Dick who's now doing a very good job of propping up the wall in Wally's new apartment. He'd probably be climbing it if he was in his suit right now, but Dick came over for pizza and movies, not Nightwing. Although Dick also apparently came over for, well…

"Doesn't have to be a big deal," Dick says. His tone implies that maybe it is a big deal, though.

"I just… why?" It's far from a well phrased question, but Wally is definitely still sort of in shock that his sort of best friend _kissed_ him.

Dick's eyes track a very obvious movement over Wally's body; he's always felt tall and skinny in a way that got him called lanky as a teenager, but under Dick's very obviously appreciative eye he thinks maybe it's working for him, even as he blushes as red as his suit.

Finally Dick's eyes land on his own and he shrugs. "I like you."

Wally manages a passable job of ignoring his racing heart, because it's still not going lightning fast - fall into the speedforce and nearly _die_ fast - and he has more important things to focus on. Like Dick's expression, which, even without the mask, is still so hard to read. "Well, we're best friends. I sort of hope you like me."

He hopes his obliviousness comes off as an obvious attempt to diffuse the lingering tension, rather than belittling whatever Dick is feeling right now that is so directed at him. He starts shaking a little.

Dick rubs a hand over his eyes, and slowly - ever so slowly now that Wally's in a slightly accelerated state of being - he pushes away from the wall and moves instead to sit on the opposite end of the couch to Wally.

"Donna's my best friend," he says, aiming the comment at the flat pack coffee table they'd assembled together a few weeks earlier. "Even Babs on a good day. You're… something else."

Wally's not sure if he should be insulted that this reality has apparently bumped him out of best friend territory. Maybe it's something to do with the blur of memories surrounding himself. He has no real idea what suddenly remembering a whole person into your childhood would do to someone. Especially if those childhoods are as entwined as Wally's and Dick's.

"Weren't you unsuccessfully trying to date Babs about six months ago?" Wally asks, not entirely sure where he's trying to steer this conversation.

Dick shrugs. "Well, sure. I would probably count that as a bad day."

Wally sits in silence; having been completely caught off guard by this whole thing, he has no idea what to say. Plus he can still feel the phantom pressure of Dick's lips against his own, a memory imprinted into his body where there was no place for it before. He's overwhelmed.

"Look. I thought maybe this was something that went both ways," Dick says, still so tense he's perched upright on the edge of the seat, likes he's ready to jump out the window - suit or no suit - at any second.

The statement throws another wrench into the slowly working cogs of Wally's brain. Sure, his apparently-not-so best friend is attractive, and maybe he's been checking him out (in and out of the suit), but it's not something that he thought would lead to this.

This being Dick _kissing_ him.

And he can't help but wonder - briefly, _hopelessly_ \- if he always had a shot. If somewhere between Dick's on-again off-again on-agains with Kori or with Barbara he could have slid into the cracks and… and what? Become another in Dick's rotating relationships that don't quite stick?

He makes a hopeless noise. "Just be real with me. What do you want here?"

"I thought I kind of made that clear?"

Wally's laugh borders on hysterical, and he takes a deep breath, an attempt to keep himself together, because Dick has pretty much become his grounding force in this reality and he's not sure how tight he can hold that line right now. "Not really. So you like me? I…" He runs a hand through his hair, his mouth dry. "The Dick I knew never really went in for the long haul, the Wally I knew, the me that was _married_-" He takes another deep breath because thinking about the mess he'd made with Linda is spectacularly unhelpful. "-I get attached. Is what I'm saying."

Dick looks at him, in the bat trained way that always left Wally feeling a little unnerved, no matter how much time he spends around bat trained heroes. "And you would consider getting attached to me?" Dick has almost never sounded so unsure.

"Well, yeah," Wally admits, his brain finally seeming to catch up to what's happening. Thankfully Dick isn't a super villain because Wally would be in deep shit if he ever took that long to get back in gear on the field. "But I can't deal with you having one foot out the door. And from experience…" Wally shrugs. Dick and long-term committed relationship are pretty far apart in his mental word association.

Dick is frowning at the coffee table again. "Maybe you don't know me all that well, if you don't know I go all in."

And Wally has to admit he's got a point. He's caught Dick enough times to know he has a tendency to jump headlong into danger and trust he'll make his way through, on a wing and a prayer. It was kind of the entire point of Robin, because it's Dick to his very core - _hope_.

"And just because I can't give you more of myself than I have to give-" Dick waves vaguely in the direction of the city outside the window. Keystone is probably in this case a metaphorical stand in for Gotham, or Blüdhaven, or the entire world for all Wally knows.

"The ultimate self-sacrifice." He means it as a joke, but he's not sure it's funny.

Judging from the sound Dick makes: half laugh, half choked sob, he doesn't find it all that funny either. "Says the person who nearly…" This time the noise is definitely closer to a sob and Wally doesn't even think, shuffling across couch cushions until he can set a slightly shaky hand against Dick's arm.

"Died?" he suggests. "Because I didn't, and I'm not planning on it." Because Dick is here, because Dick is acting as his anchor, his goddamn lightning rod in this world, and Wally has been pretty slow on the uptake. And sure, he'll throw himself against the boundaries of reality to save Dick - to save all the Titans - over and over, but only because he can't lose this. He squeezes Dick's arm and thinks about maybe kissing him back.

"I'm just saying," Dick barrels on with whatever point he was reaching, using Wally as his lifeline for once. "It will take work, from both of us, and trust and understanding, from _both_ of us."

Wally thinks he's possibly gained some new insight into Dick's relationships. Barbara trusts about as easily as any bat, which is to say never if she can help it, and Kori has a tendency to stubbornness and a strong will that probably don't lead to a whole lot of being understanding. And maybe the failings of commitment Wally dropped at Dick's feet belong elsewhere.

But Wally's pretty sure he's got trust and understanding in buckets, especially when it comes to Dick. There's a reason he's so quick to follow Nightwing wherever he leads.

"Okay," Wally says, "I'm willing to work for us if you are."

Bats would probably have something bad to say about the open and desperate hope practically shining in Dick's eyes. Something about keeping your emotions in check. Wally's never been a fan. He tips forward, the hand not on Dick's arm coming up to settle against his cheek, and this time he's pressing a gentle kiss against Dick's mouth.

When he pulls away Dick leans with him, lips slightly parted, shallow breaths filling the space between them. Wally's own breath catches in his throat. "You really like me, huh?" he asks quietly.

Dick rolls his eyes, grabs a fistful of Wally's shirt and pulls. He goes willingly, without hesitation, because he's learnt how to jump without thinking from the man in front of him, and he only briefly gets kneed in the stomach as he crawls over Dick, coming to rest between his thighs, hands braced against the arm of the chair behind his head. Wally thinks, from the pleased sounds coming from Dick's throat as Wally slowly traces the roof of his mouth with his tongue, this may have been what he came over for anyway.

He's so preoccupied he doesn't register the momentary vertigo for what it is until his back hits the floor and the unpleasantly loud scrape of wood against linoleum causes him to wince and pull away. Dick sits up, straddled across him, one hand on the coffee table - which explains the noise. Apparently he had the presence of mind to make sure they didn't land on it, or maybe he was just grasping for something to balance. His wide eyed shock shows he hadn't been planning on ending up on the floor.

Wally slowly levers himself up onto his elbows, his back protesting at hitting the floor despite the number of times it's been thrown into a wall. A laugh bubbles up unbidden and then he's bending forward, burying further laughter against Dick's chest.

He can feel Dick's laughter shaking through them both. "We," Dick starts, stopping to take a deep breath and swallow his laughter, "Should order that pizza."

It's probably just the promise of pizza, but Wally thinks he's in love. Too attached too fast and he's not going to say anything, but he wants Dick with him whenever he can be, whether it's out on the job because he knows Nightwing will have his back, or in his apartment going from making out to ordering pizza and laughing together.

Wally's fairly sure the fond smile he gets when he looks up at Dick is transparent, a window to what he's feeling, but Dick doesn't seem to mind, leaning close and pressing one last kiss against Wally's lips before standing with far more grace than Wally's ever had. He stretches out and Wally follows the movement, wondering how he could have been so blind to his own wants.

He takes Dick's hand when he offers it, and then when he's stood he doesn't let go, tugging Dick with him as he collapses onto the couch, pulling Dick into his lap.

"This is how we ended up on the floor, you know," Dick says, face tilted so he can look Wally in the eye even though his lips are a brush away from Wally's own.

"I thought we ended up on the floor because you wanted to be on top of me."

Dick's arms wind around Wally's neck and now that some of the urgency has evaporated he seems to be attempting for a slower seduction. Not that Wally needs it. He's already completely gone for his probably more than best friend. Dick smirks, a motion Wally catches because he keeps dropping his gaze back to Dick's lips. "I didn't necessarily mind being under you."

Wally closes his eyes because he was about to try and have a moment and it's difficult when Dick is so willing and so pressed up against him. "Dinner first, _Dick_," he says.

He opens one eye to find Dick pulling away, arms sliding from around his shoulders, hands against his chest and then Dick is falling back against the couch cushions and Wally is definitely not going to follow him because he doesn't actually enjoy falling on the floor, but he still frowns slightly at the distance, especially when Dick pulls his phone out from where it fell onto the couch cushions during the previous session of horizontal kissing.

"Are you ignoring me right now?" Wally asks.

Dick grins at him. "I'm ordering pizza. You're the one who wanted dinner." He stretches out in a very deliberate fashion and eyes Wally over the top of his phone.

Wally thinks about saying he's changed his mind, pulling Dick back into his lap, or maybe to his bedroom. It would be so easy to see how far they can take this without taking a second to breathe. "I want you to know how important you are to me," he says instead.

Dick leans out so he can drop his phone onto the coffee table, which is about a foot further away from the couch than it was this morning. Then he rolls himself upright again, not pressed into Wally's space but close enough that he can take one of Wally's hands in his own. "I know," he says.

Which, Wally should have expected. If even Roy - so frequently caught up in his own bullshit he doesn't even like Wally most days - can figure out Dick's the most important person in his entire world, then World's Greatest Detective Jr. shouldn't have a problem. If Dick even still counts as junior these days.

Dick squeezes his hand. "I don't want to have to live in a world without you in it. You make it better, you make _me_ better."

It's not exactly a love confession but it feels like so much more because as much of a sucker as Wally is for clichés this is entirely theirs. Something between the two of them and no one else. Wally leans back against the seat. "It's a burden I've accepted."

Dick smacks his shoulder. "I thought we were having a moment."

"We were, but then I remembered pizza."

Dick rolls his eyes and leans back over, grasping towards the coffee table before with a frustrated noise he grips its edge and tugs it sort of back into place, swiping his phone off it, and never once letting go of Wally's hand within his own.

Wally figures that if this is his new reality he can get used to it.


End file.
